Chiel, how would you describe your cooking style?

I would describe my cooking style as creative, innovative and intense. French cuisine with modern and international influences.

What's your favourite dish to make?

I love making sweetbreads with truffles. I like the intense flavours of the sweetbread and the truffle. After baking the sweetbreads crispy, I glaze them and the flavours come together perfectly.

What is your favourite ingredient to work with?

I like working with fresh vegetables from our own garden, the most beautiful fresh white fish and langoustines. I always use these three ingredients in my menus, often in combination. I like the short preparation time of many of these products, which ensures that the taste remains really pure.

Who is one of your top suppliers or producers?

My top supplier is Hazeberg from De Spurs. He delivers very exclusive and surprising products every month, such as mushrooms, Japanese Magnolias, special potato varieties and fruit. All these products cannot simply be ordered from other suppliers. These products are a source of inspiration for new flavours and dishes.

What is the biggest challenge you’ve faced in your culinary career?

Establishing, discovering and sticking to my own cooking style. It’s a constant search for products and suppliers through which you can give your own interpretation to a dish. Sometimes you subconsciously deviate from that. Those small deviations can provide new insights into certain processes, but they can also bring me back to the roots of what I want and like.   A good example is the only thing I just don't like, unfortunately, and those are oysters. I try it again and again and I also try to give it my own vision and twist, but I always come to the conclusion that if I don't like it enough myself, I won't present it to my guests.

Which gastronomic trend are you excited about the most?

I like the fact that vegetables play an increasingly important role in dishes, as well as the rise in awareness of the origin of ingredients. That is why we like to work with products from our own vegetable garden as much as possible and this trend also fits well with us and our concept.

If you could only eat one dish for the rest of your life, what would that be?

Baked turbot with truffle and risotto. It’s a dish I ate in Giethoorn at restaurant Lindenhof when I was still doing the chef’s training course. It was the first time I understood what good food can do to you.

What’s one thing in the area that your guests absolutely need to see or do?

Hardenberg has a beautiful natural environment with lots of walking and cycling routes. When the weather is nice, I recommend spending an afternoon sailing on the river De Vecht.

Thank you, Chiel.